Category Archives: Cornucopia of thoughts

Posted by Dan

I’m gonna do this Steve style, which means one thing: bullet points.

• Is there anything more overrated in baseball than hitting for the cycle? I mean, it’s a nice, interesting accomplishment, but come on. My main problem with it, is that if Fielder goes 4-4 tomorrow with 2 HR, a double and a single, it will get merely a passing mention between the Red Sox and Yankees highlights. Make one of those HR a triple, and its breaking news/history. It’s also a less productive stat line.  Billy Ripken, on the MLB Network today was talking about it and said two things that seemed ridonkulous. First, he claimed “late in the game, it’s like a no-hitter. It’s all you’re thinking about.” Then, speaking of Orlando Hudson (who completed his cycle with a 6th inning triple) said, “As soon as he hit it he knew he was going for a triple. If he gets thrown out, oh well, he gets thrown out.” That seems absurd. Granted it was a huge Dodger lead at the time, but I’d like to think no MLB player would think like that. 
• Despite the fact that seven games is a meaningless sample size, I’ll quickly highlight a few good things: First, Corey Hart has a 5BB:8K ratio through his first 26 ABs. Last year he only walked 27 times in 612 ABs, which is Michael Bourn-esque. The Brewers offense cannot afford to have someone compile 600+ ABs with a .300 OBP in front of Braun and Fielder this season. Secondly, Weeks had a good first week. Going .276/.364/.448 against tough righties Lincecum, Cain, Harden, Zambrano, Dempster and Volquez. The 2-5 start is discouraging but that is a tough week of matchups for a nearly exclusively right handed lineup.
• Unfortunately, Brewers pitching racked up a brutal 35 BBs to only 45 strikeouts over the first week.  That ties them with Toronto for the most walks in MLB, which is simply terrible.  The 45 strikeouts are also the 10th worst in all of baseball. Jeff Suppan is obviously terrible, and his contract is going to be a huge hindrance this year and next year. I’ve heard people suggest moving him to the pen and replacing him with Villanueva (if Suppan continues to struggle, and Hoffman returns). I hate this idea. Villanueva’s skillset allows him to come in for high leverage situations in late innings and also go multiple innings. His arm is too important to the bullpen to either return to the rotation or remain tied to the closer role long term which is why we need Hoffman to get healthy.  He reportedly threw Monday and felt well and is “on track” for an end of the month return.
• Lastly, shock and horror on Sportscenter this morning as Chien Ming Wang got shelled again last night for the Yankees.  The general public thinks this guy is good (19 wins in 2006 and 2007 OMG OMG!) but in reality he has NEVER struck out more than 4.9 per nine innings in a full season. He gets alot of ground balls, but he’s certainly not nearly as good as his back to back 19 win seasons make Sportscenter think he is.

Posted by Steve

Just a few more things to add to the most recent cornucopia of thoughts.

I somehow managed to omit probably the best news of the past week:  Yovani Gallardo will not be pitching in the World Baseball Classic.  With how much the Brewers have riding on Gallardo this season, this was a risk they really couldn’t afford to take.  The decision was left up to Gallardo, but I’m sure the Brewers made it known they would prefer him not to play.  Yo is probably the most important (or at least most irreplaceable) player on the team.

That’s why I don’t fully understand Ken Macha’s hesitation to “put pressure” on Gallardo.  Macha has said he probably won’t start Gallardo on opening day to keep said pressure of him.  Thing is, Gallardo hasn’t shown any tendency to be adversely affected by pressure at any point in his short career.  In fact, we’ve heard him praised for his poise.  If the Brewers were willing to start him in Game 1 of their first playoff series since 1982 after missing most of the season, why can’t he handle being the opening day starter?

Not that I’m overly concerned with him not starting on opening day–it really doesn’t matter much as long as he’s pitching every fifth day.  I just find it curious that Macha seems worried he can’t handle it.

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Last year’s first rounder, Brett Lawrie, is switching positions from catcher to second base.  I can’t blame him for this move.  Lawrie is projected to be a quick riser (Baseball America already has him in their top 100 prospects, and he hasn’t even played a minor league game yet!), and moving to second should help him move quickly.  His offensive game is advanced, but learning to catch probably would have slowed his progression somewhat.  Not to mention the Brewers have two promising catchers ahead of him in the system in Angel Salome and Jonathan Lucroy.

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Ned Yost seems so far away.  Several times I’ve discussed things I liked about Yost, mainly the fact that he rarely sac bunted and he rarely issued intentional walks.  Things I didn’t like about Yost were, as shown by the Sha-wuuhhh? tag, even more documented here.  The absolute worst was his bullpen management, but I was also very critical about his tendency to leave starting pitchers in for high pitch counts with regularity.

Everything I’ve heard so far from Macha has indicated that he will be better at the things Yost did poorly without straying much from the things Yost did that I liked.  A perfect example is this entry from TH’s blog.  No more pitcher abuse!

Again, we won’t know anything for sure until we see his strategy in actual games, but something tells me he will infuriate me much less frequently than Ol’ Ned.

Posted by Steve

The further we get into this off-season, the more flawed the draft pick compensation system appears to be. Ken Rosenthal’s latest piece hints that remaining Type A free agents may actually be better served to hold out until the June Draft before signing with a team. The reason for this is after the draft, teams signing any of those players would no longer need to forfeit a draft pick. As a result, there would surely be more interest from more teams. Crazy to think about, isn’t it?

Oddly enough, this could actually be beneficial for Sheets. He has a history of dominating in the first half of the season and wearing down by the end of the year. Starting in June would not only reassure teams by allowing him more time to rest his arm, but it would keep him fresh up until the end of the season. Of course, it would suck for the Brewers because they wouldn’t get any draft pick for Sheets.

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Speaking of Sheets, everything I’m reading has the Rangers as the only serious suitor for him—even though they’ve shown no interest in offering a long-term deal to this point. I can’t help but think Texas would be a terrible fit for Sheets. He’s a fly-ball pitcher, and The Ballpark at Arlington was the number one hitter’s park in the league last season. Not to mention the Rangers aren’t likely to be a good team this year.

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Jim Powell continues to prove how awesome he is. Check out this classy farewell letter he wrote to brewerfan.net.

Posted by Steve

First, some thoughts on yesterday’s game.

• It was actually close for most of the game, and the Brewers were lucky to have a 3-0 in the middle of the game. Each team squandered several scoring chances over the first five innings. At one point Bill said, “The Brewers could easily be leading 8-0,” to which I thought, “And they could easily be trailing 4-3.”
• It’s funny to me to that some praising Sheets for yesterday’s outing are the ones who had been criticizing him. He really didn’t pitch much differently that he has over the past few weeks… He was a little luckier this time, and he didn’t make his mistakes in crucial situations last night, unlike the Houston start. Oh, and he had a ton of run support for a change.
• I have felt all season the Brewers are better than the Cardinals, but I couldn’t believe what I was watching yesterday. The Cardinals making errors—and mental errors at that, is something I’m just not used to, yet they’ve regularly done it in games against the Brewers this season.
• The Brewers own Rick Ankiel this season to the tune of a .619 OPS in 53 plate appearances. It seems the guy will swing at any fastball above his letters. The Brewers only give him that pitch or a curve in the dirt and he’ll get himself out.
• Finally, we come to Ryan Braun’s pwnage of the Cardinals pitching. I couldn’t say it better than Bernie Miklasz of STLToday.com in his blog entry titled, “Changing of the Guard: Brewers Own Cardinals (I enjoyed his title as well).

One more thing: I simply do not understand what the Cardinals are trying to do in their approach to Milwaukee bopper Ryan Braun. This kid simply murders them, and the numbers almost read like fiction.

In 57 ABs vs. the Cardinals this season Braun has 28 hits for a .491 BA. He’s slammed 7 homers and has 13 RBIs. His OBP is .516, and his SLG is .965 …

In his two-season career, Braun has 99 ABs against the Cardinals and he’s raked ‘em for 43 hits … that’s a .434 BA … and he has 10 homers and a SLG of .838.

And yet the Cardinals keep pitching Braun the same. In yesterday’s blog I relied on the STATS scouting reports to offer a glimpse at Braun’s weak spots as a hitter, and basically you pound him low with fastballs and sliders and mix in the change. Or you can ride the fastball up and get him to chase it. What you don’t do is throw this guy any heat from the top of the knees to the belt; he’ll destroy you. And you don’t try to blast him inside; Braun loves to turn on those pitches in. So what do the Cardinals keep doing? Of course: throw the mid-thigh gas, and try to smoke him inside. That was their strategy Tuesday, and Braun launched a thigh-high fastball into the Milwaukee bullpen for a two-run jack. And he added two singles. That’s right: give it to Braun exactly where he likes it. And let the dude keep mauling them. It’s almost comical the way Braun slaps them around. And they simply refuse to alter their approach. It’s as incomprehensible as anything I’ve witnessed of this team in recent years. Yep, the Cardinals will keep showing Braun that they’re right; you just watch.

• Let’s talk about Mike Cameron. His gigantic August has vaulted him to the top of the pack among center fielders. He is now third in all of MLB behind megastars Grady Sizemore and Josh Hamilton in OPS among center fielders. Cameron’s .871 OPS is identical to Prince Fielder’s. I could argue Cameron has been the best center fielder in the national league this season, particularly factoring in defense. This signing has proven to be a fantastic one, even before figuring in that he was a second or third option signed late in the year. I fully expect the Brewers to pick up his $10 million option for next season.
• The argument could be made that last night’s game was the most important of the year, at least in terms of playoff implications. It was a 12 or 13 percentage-point swing, with the winner’s chances jumping by about six percent and the loser dropping by a similar amount. That is a gigantic swing for one game. The Crew jumped from 85% to 90.6%, while the Cards fell to just 6.4%. Of course, tonight’s game will have a similar swing. Simply put, though, the Brewers find themselves in great position.
• Last night on a pre-game radio show, the following question was posed on a “round table” segment: If the Brewers sweep these two games from the Cardinals, will they lock up the wildcard? The first panelists seemed appalled by the question, basically saying there’s still an entire month to go and it’s way too early to say something like that. The second panelist was sabermetric-minded Rob Neyer, and his simple answer was: “Absolutely.” This definitely brought a smile to my face, because although I’m afraid to say it, I agree with him. A 5 ½ game lead with a month to go is substantial in any form, but when you consider the Brewers are considered/projected to be a better team than both the Mets and Cardinals, it’s huge. Add on the Brewers’ favorable schedule compared to the Cards, and… Well, like I said. They’re in a great situation, especially if they sweep tonight.

Posted by Steve

Haven’t posted in the last few days. I don’t really have anything in particular I want to talk about, but I figured I’d get something up. Couple good games to end the Reds series leaves the Crew with yet another winning road trip. Hot diggity dog. Few quick things.

• Jim Powell said on the radio today that the collective bargaining agreement prevents a team from playing on more than 20 days in a row. Wednesday was the Crew’s 20th straight day with a game, which means it would be illegal for the Brewers to play tomorrow. I don’t know why, but that struck my as cool/amusing.
• The Craig Counsell consecutive start streak is at five and counting. No word yet as to which Yost family member Russell Branyan abducted or what Branyan’s demands are; I’m just assuming the authorities are keeping it under wraps for precautionary purposes.
• Over lunch I saw on some ESPN2 show people discussing how the Prince Fielder-Manny Parra incident “could help the Brewers turn things around.” Yep, and if the Brewers fall apart and miss the playoffs, I expect to read how the incident “divided the clubhouse and became a fatal distraction.”
• Suppan looked pretty good today, and it’s hopefully a good sign. Randomly, his career ERA in July is 5.34 (easily his worst month), while August is 4.67. He’s had long career, so those are pretty significant samples. I won’t even try to speculate why he’s been that bad in August, but if the numbers hold true his worst games should be behind him. Even more encouraging his is September/October ERA of 4.05.
• Dave Bush pitched well on the road and won. I know; I imagine I’m just as shocked as you. I was sure the starting rotation home-road platoon based on a handful of innings from this season was going to work out perfectly, but I guess I was horribly wrong.
• Sweet game for Rickie today. May have been his best all-around game of the season. Keep him in there for a week, Ned, and see what happens. My guess: He’s finally realizing it’s big-boy time.
• A very winnable week is ahead for the Crew. Four at home against the pathetic Nationals, and then three on the road against the almost-as-bad Padres. Winning less than four games would cause Brewer fan mutiny. 5-2 is a lofty but attainable goal, and that’s what I’ll be hoping for.
• Finally, I’m laying it on the line. I’ve been meaning to revamp (or at least update) the site for, like, three months now and keep forgetting/putting it off. The “About Me” page is an abomination and hasn’t been up to date since about two months after this blog’s inception. The roster down the right side needs some work too. You’d think I’d be excited enough by the fact that Tony Gwynn Jr. is no longer on the team to change it, but I guess not. Also, apparently the Brewers added some big name starting pitcher or something? I’ll look into it and edit accordingly. Anyway, I figure by posting that here for **the world to see, it will somehow force me to actually follow through with this.

** In this particular context, “World”=”People who have visited this blog more than twice.”